Philip Agee, born on 19th of january in 1935, was an ex-CIA officer who became a prominent critic of CIA policies, detailing his experiences in the text “Inside the Company: CIA Diary”. Agee ultimately defected to Cuba, dying there in 2008.
Philip Agee (1935 - 2008) served as a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer for eight years, joining the organization in 1960. He was assigned posts in Montevideo, Mexico City, and Quito, Ecuador.
Agee resigned from the CIA in 1968 following the Tlatelolco massacre in Mexico City, in which the U.S.-supported government engaged in mass shootings and arrests of a crowd of more than ten thousand protesters. The same massacre also played a role in the political radicalization of Subcomandante Marcos of the Zapatistas.
Agee moved to London and published “Inside the Company”, a tell-all text that, among other things, detailed his work in spying on diplomats, engaging in illegal activity to force a diplomatic break between Ecuador and Cuba, naming President José Figueres Ferrer of Costa Rica, President Luis Echeverría Álvarez of Mexico, and President Alfonso López Michelsen of Colombia as CIA collaborators, and exposing the identities of dozens of CIA agents.
For the exposure of agents, Agee was expelled from the United Kingdom. Agee was also eventually expelled from the Netherlands, France, West Germany and Italy, and was compelled to live under a series of socialist governments - Grenada under Maurice Bishop, then Nicaragua under the Sandinistas, and finally Cuba under Castro. Agee died in Cuba in January 2008.
"I don’t think we have ever had real democracy in this country. Anyone who studies adoption of the constitution will understand quite clearly that; democracy - as we understand that on today; was the last thing the founding fathers had in mind when they wrote the constitution…it was: to establish strong central authority responding the elitist interests in United States.
That’s private property. And those men who wrote the constitution were representatives of the elites. They were the lawyers, bankers, merchants, the land owners, slave owners and so forth. And they write the constitution for their own private interest$. That is how government has served ever since. And that is why we have so little democracy in United States."
- Philip Agee
Philip Agee - spartacus educational
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ok I’m in a typing mood so I’m just going to say what prompted this post
I’m carpooling with some coworkers to an off-site work event. at some point the conversation gets on the topic of how a lot of movies now are sequels and remakes. out of nowhere, one of them complains about how remakes cast black actors to play previously white characters “90% of the time, even though black people are only 13% of the population” (it happens but 90% seems highly exaggerated?). another replies something along the lines of “they’re just making movies that show the world they want” (thinking back it feels like a dog whistle for great replacement?). then one of them pulls out “despite being 6% of the population, black men make up 50% of domestic violence cases” which is obviously some weird spin on the FBI stats trope which I hope everyone here knows is BS and why. and to finish off another sarcastically replies “well that’s because all police are racist” and they all start smugly, sarcastically repeating it to each other as if it’s not true until the conversation moves to other things.
I feel like I’m going crazy because I’ve known these guys for years, and while I knew they were generally conservative and not so progressive on racial issues, I clocked them more as grillpilled libertarians who are simply ignorant due to being “sheltered” by the relative comfort they live in (we’re all tech employees). but today just felt strange. am I being too sensitive if this incident makes me want to leave ASAP, even though they’re otherwise polite and helpful coworkers who are nice to me (a person who isn’t white but also isn’t black, which is probably why they felt okay saying this shit around me)?
All of that is racist as hell. I’m sorry that happened. Fuck those guys. You’re not being too sensitive. That said, I don’t know if I’d leave a good tech job in this market for that unless it was for a pay raise.
The most actionable statement with HR would probably be the one about crime stats. Dangerously close to 13:50 there.
If you’re white, don’t hesitate to interrupt when you hear people say shit like that. (Talking to myself here too).
this is super important.
you are not being too sensitive. next time cut the brake lines right before remembering you can’t go
You are not being too sensitive at all and I would be careful around them. If they say those things about black people then they might have feelings about you too and being alone with a group of racist white men can be dangerous for someone who is non-white or not a man.
I used to work for an older white man (when I was underage) who used to say similar types of racist things to me as an intimidation technique (I think). The things he said would gradually grow worse until he violated me.
Personally it was a lesson for me to never be alone with someone or some people who feel ‘superior’ over another group, because they will act on it. Although the racist things he said weren’t about me, he left unsaid the he viewed me as inferior too.